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Sports and cartoons take over Oxford's Nokias
NTL and O2 share the love over mobile telly trials

By Jo Best

Published: Wednesday 11 May 2005

O2 and NTL Broadcast have taken the wraps off their TV-over-mobile trial, with a raft of big name channels signed up to pipe their programming to some of Oxford's phones.

Among the 16 channels available during the trial will be Cartoon Network, CNN, Discovery Channel and Sky Sports News.

The trial will undergo performance testing in July and will hit 350 phone users in September for six months. All of the square-eyed mobile triallists will be given a Nokia 7710 phone equipped with a special DVB-H (digital video broadcasting - handheld) receiver to watch their channel selections.

A cross section of local phone users between the ages of 18 and 45 will be approached by O2 to take part in the trial.

DVB-H has been attracting the attention of the mobile realm's big names, including Nokia, which yesterday announced its specs for the standard.

However, currently the spectrum is unlicensed. NTL Broadcast and O2 are hoping to persuade watchdog Ofcom to step into the regulatory fray if the feedback from the trial is positive.